Silicon-based nanoelectronic devices such as transistors are approaching upper bounds for performance due to inherent limitations of silicon. As a result, various materials have been proposed as replacements for silicon in nanoelectronic devices. One such material is graphene. Graphene has been shown to have unique properties useful for nanoelectronic applications, such as high carrier mobility.
However, a high contact resistance has been associated with metal/graphene contacts which impacts performance. For example, in graphene field-effect transistors (FETs) with channels that are several μm in length, the high contact resistance associated with the metal/graphene contacts impacts performance. As channel lengths scale to technologically relevant values in the range of hundreds of nanometers or below, high contact resistance of the metal/graphene contacts dominates performance.